Colon Cancer

Colon cancer is the development of malignant cells in the colon, part of the broader colorectal cancer group that also includes rectal cancer. Its risk factors include older age, high intake of fat, sugar, alcohol, red meat and processed meats, obesity, smoking, and a lack of physical exercise, and its signs and symptoms may include blood in the stool, a change in bowel movements, weight loss, abdominal pain and fatigue. Diagnosis is by sampling suspicious areas of the colon, typically during colonoscopy or sigmoidoscopy, and treatment may combine surgery, radiation therapy, chemotherapy and targeted therapy. Surgical treatment of colon cancer was considered essentially futile until the late nineteenth century; by 1880 only ten large bowel resections had been recorded, of which just three were considered successful, and the surgeon D. Lowson's case published in The Lancet on 25 March 1893 is the earliest documented right colectomy with a primary anastomosis, opening the path to modern resective surgery.